MY MORNING WAS THE SAME as always: two elderly retirees and one married soldier who came in the same time almost every week. He never made an appointment, but I always kept the spot open for him. He was nice and easy, tipped well, and didn’t groan and moan while I did my job.

I now had “free time” to help clean up around the spa and avoid walk-ins—as much as they could be avoided. I didn’t like the uncertainty of them. They were always uncomfortable and they hardly ever came back. Even the fittest of bodies let their insecurities shine in my room. It was comforting and disheartening to know that other people thought of their bodies in the same harmful way that I did.

I was pulling out my second round of towels from the dryer when I thought of how I used to have to roll silverware when I waitressed at a steakhouse. I guess all jobs come with add-on chores.

“That guy came here for you,” Mali told me while we folded towels.

“What guy?”

“The one you used to like,” she said. The way she wrapped “like” around her tongue made me feel like a child.

Oh. Brien. Great.

“When?”

“About ten minutes before you got here.”

I dropped a towel onto the pile before I folded it. “What? Why didn’t you tell me?”

She snickered. “Because I was afraid you would call him and we can’t have that.” She shrugged her shoulders. I gaped at her, grabbed the towel, and threw it at her.

“I would not call him, by the way.” I may have been a little defensive. Anyway, I didn’t think I’d call, even if I was curious to know why he came by. I know I didn’t leave my earring in his bed, that’s for sure. I guess I could call him after my lunch break.

Okay so, maybe Mali was right.

“Mhmm.” She nodded yes with her lips jutted out sarcastically. The deep wrinkles on her bronzed skin made her look extra serious, though I knew she was mostly teasing. She’d never liked Brien and even cut off the electricity in the lobby when he came to see me the first time after our breakup. In her defense, I was crying and he was accusing me of something that I couldn’t even remember anymore. That must’ve meant I was innocent, right?

Truth was, I wasn’t as sad as everyone thought I should be after we broke up. And, truth was, I’d used him to fill something broken inside of me. That’s what most relationships actually boiled down to.

Mali interrupted my sour memories of Brien. “We have a walk-in,” she said.

Her back was hunched so she could see the little security television screen. I couldn’t make out whether it was a man or a woman, but I knew Elodie had just started on her two-thirty appointment and we were the only two in until four, when three more therapists came in for the night shift.

“I’ll take it. I don’t have any more appointments today.”

Honestly, I was hoping there wouldn’t be any walk-ins and that I would be able to do laundry, clean my room, and help Mali with the bookkeeping, instead of giving a massage, but this was my job. This is what I chose. That’s what I told myself every time my fingers ached or my head pounded from the smell of bleach on the towels just after they’d been washed.

I pushed through the curtain in the lobby to find Kael walking around the small space, almost pacing. There were only a few chairs in the lobby, but between them and the front desk, they took up so much space. I watched him walk back and forth before I pushed all the way through the curtain.

“Hey?” I greeted Kael, my stomach tied in a knot.

“Hey.”

We stood there, standing in the thick smell of incense and the dim lights in the room. The old PC tower on the floor hummed between us.

“Is everything okay?” As I asked, it dawned on me that he might be there for a reason.

“Yeah, yeah. I came to get a massage, actually.” He held up his hands.

“Really?”

“Yeah. Is that okay?” His voice was soft, an unsure question.

I nodded and brought my hand up to my mouth. I didn’t know why I was smiling, but I was and I couldn’t stop.